Physics
Scientific paper
Oct 2003
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2003georl..30sssc3n&link_type=abstract
Geophysical Research Letters, Volume 30, Issue 19, pp. SSC 3-1, CiteID 2010, DOI 10.1029/2003GL017808
Physics
12
Ionosphere: Auroral Ionosphere (2704), Ionosphere: Ionosphere/Magnetosphere Interactions (2736), Magnetospheric Physics: Current Systems (2409)
Scientific paper
High-precision vector magnetic field observations from the Ørsted satellite are used to investigate small-scale, field-aligned currents on spatial scales down to 600 m. Placed in a low-Earth, polar orbit, the slowly drifting orbit plane has covered all local times since launch in 1999 with more than 25000 polar passes. Small-scale currents are primarily found in the cusp with densities of 10-100 μAm-2, reaching more than 1000 μAm-2 during disturbed conditions. These values are 1-2 orders of magnitude larger than large-scale region 1 and 2 currents. Current densities are 2-4 times larger when the ionosphere is illuminated than when in darkness. While the location of currents follows the changes in cusp location with changing IMF, the intensity of the currents seems to depend on the level of solar wind turbulence. The data suggest that small-scale currents may be associated with significant local heating of the ionosphere and thermosphere.
Christiansen Freddy
Neubert Torsten
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